Anti-IED system undermined by workers
Fox News tells the story about a system of barriers, called a “culvert denial system” that was designed to prevent terrorists from planting IEDs on convoy routes and harming US troops were only half-assed installed and may have contributed significantly to the deaths of Americans in Afghanistan;
Millions of U.S. dollars have been spent on thousands of so-called “culvert denial systems” since 2009, but a scathing report released Tuesday by the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction says hundreds of the devices were never installed or installed improperly. The report said an investigation has been launched “into whether this apparent failure to perform may have been a factor in the death or injury of several U.S. soldiers.”
The investigation has led to two arrests so far — an Afghan contractor and a sub-contractor. The men, who were paid $1 million by the U.S. government to install 250 culvert denial systems, didn’t install the devices as promised. The ones they did install were installed incorrectly, according to the report.
Yeah, you can blame the Afghans, like I do, but they got away with it because no one was checking on them. It seems to me that if a bunch of my troops were being injured by IEDs in places that were supposed to be protected, I’d have probably got suspicious back in 2009, rather than wait for some Inspector General to uncover the scumbaggery years later.
Problems with the anti-bomb systems were brought up last year by the inspector general’s office, which sent an alert letter to the military.
Last year? Just like johnny-on-the-spot, aincha?
Category: Terror War
Inspect what you expect.
Exactly why I want our defense budget lowered. It’s less funds they can abuse. My faith in our military’s spending abilities has nearly hit rock bottom.
More LCS bullshit that should make all tax payers eyes bleed: http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/07/23/gao-recommends-navy-pause-lcs-program.html?comp=1198882887570&rank=1
Gee, can I have my tax money back?
Make whoever paid those contractors drive the roads that were supposed to be secured by those devices.
Twice.
Find out the people who were involved in this, and shoot them on the spot for murder of our troops.
So the “culvert denial systems” don’t prevent IED attacks, and there’s a brand new $34 million dollar building waiting to be demolished? The Afghan gov’t is charging $1,000.00 per shipping container?
That sounds just about right.
I’m not surprised. lazy arab bastards will do the minimum always. we had a work gang of day laborers filling sand bags. they were stuffing 2-3 empty sandbags into one and then filling it with dirt so they could finish the bundles faster and get paid. when the escort soldier finally caught on and reported it, they all got fired and didn’t get paid. then Joe had to go through and undue all of their “work” and start from scratch.
Wow, they’re just finding out about this now. They should do a review of all projects that have been done in Iraq and Afghanistan – would make their heads spin.
@8 – They’re afraid to, considering these shennanigans are just scratching the surface. God only knows what they’d find.
Shocker. They should’ve realized this when they saw that the Afghans learned contracting and CERP rules and know them better than we do.
I saw plenty of contracts there that made me shake my head, I reported projects to the lawyers from years prior that Afghans were complaining about being broken.
I also dealt with some of these “culvert denial systems” in my area too. IEDs were getting emplaced just fine, even in places where the systems were installed. Go figure.
We had a very expensive device that was added to most of our convoy humvees in 2005 in Iraq. this device included 5 minutes of training. The training was: “Turn this to test, if the green light comes on, turn it to on. That’s it.”
The device was supposed to help with IEDs, but when it was actually tested with instruments a month later…it didn’t work. POS.
I have photos of about nine guys standing around, and one innefectivly driving construction equipment. You can see this every day where I am at right now. Hell I have to see it every day.
They are STILL building stuff out here.
Big Navy and NECC in their infinite wisdom has chosen to cut the Active and Reserve SeaBees by almost 50%. You know because it is so expensive to fund a Battalion and keep it employed. Contracting out the construction is soooooooo much cheaper.
I bet we also would have took one look at this miracle IED prtector and told our O’s it would not work and come up with a better device and install that.
(bogus crap removed)
Intruder Alert, Intruder Alert. Man your Battle Stations.
I see a simpler solution. We have combat Engineers that are probably much more talented than the taliban.
Simply make it known to the locals they are strictly forbidden from getting within 20 meters of culverts.
Then set our own booby traps.
When Hadji goes to plant an IED he sets off a claymore that sends him to meet his 70 virgins.
But this will never happen, we worry more about the local dumbasses who hate us anyway and their goat herds.